


A House of Dregs

by Jay2KWinger



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:14:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26921212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jay2KWinger/pseuds/Jay2KWinger
Summary: As various leaders try to unite the scattered remnants of the Fallen under the banners of their Houses, some outliers strike out on their own.
Kudos: 12





	1. A House of Dregs

**Author's Note:**

> Foreword: I've been especially active in the r/DestinyJournals subreddit as of late, and began writing a number of different shorts. I'm going to start re-posting them here.

Sterling helped set the crate down off the back of the truck, then turned to his employer. "You sure about this, C.T.?"

"Relax," came the reply. "I've worked with this crew before. Their pay is good." A smaller crate was set on top of the one Sterling had unloaded. "You worry too much."

Sterling shook his head, reflexively checking his pistol. "I'm just sayin', man, they're Fallen. Never met a Fallen that hasn't tried to kill me."

"You spend too much time dirtside. Head out to the Reef sometime. Long as you keep your piece holstered, they'll leave you be." A roguish smile and a spread of the hands. "Trust me."

Sterling made an unconvinced noise as he glanced up, seeing a Fallen pushing back the hood on their cape, their cloak shimmering off as they did. The alien eyed the two of them, before barking at the lead smuggler in its language. " _Chumiira?_ " It gestured threateningly with its wire rifle.

Charlie Tango held his hands in clear view. "Relax, we're alone." Then, he repeated himself, " _Mamiira._ "

The Fallen glared briefly at the pair of them, then reached up with one hand to touch a comm-relay on its ether-mask, relaying something. A few moments later, a skiff came out of cloak above them, and another Fallen swung down from the ship. Sterling realized that both were Dregs, only having two arms. The one from the ship was larger than the other, but its lower set of arms were in the process of re-growing. This one, evidently a leader, had a large sword on its back.

It made a chuffing noise toward Charlie, who spread his arms. "Koroa! Glad to see you again, Big Man."

"Tango." The Fallen leader looked toward Sterling, then gestured with a hand. "Who?"

"No one you need to worry about, Big Man. Not a Guardian. Just a guy helping with transpo." Charlie slapped the side of the truck. "His truck."

Koroa made a grunting sound, but then it advanced on Sterling, who stepped back against the back of his truck. The Fallen tapped the butt of his pistol in its holster, leaning in to peer at him suspiciously. After an uncomfortable moment, Koroa stepped back and looked at its crewmate. " _Iirrma._ " The other Fallen visibly relaxed, putting up its weapon. Koroa turned back to Charlie.

Charlie affected a hurt expression. "You don't trust me?"

"Houseless trust no one," the Fallen grunted. "Trust is luxury."

Charlie nodded understanding. "Yeah, I know how that is." He casually leaned against the crates. "So, you see where I have mine. I don't see any payment."

Koroa tapped something on its gauntlet, and another Fallen transmatted down from the ship, though this one had a crate of its own. It had evidently seen better days, and had Reef insignia. The Fallen held it while its leader walked over, opening the lid of the small crate to show a stack of silver, likewise stamped with a Reef sigil. Charlie nodded, and opened one of his crates, revealing several components, packed in straw.

"Jump drive cores," Charlie pronounced. "Might need a little work, but all the parts are here."

The Fallen holding the crate of silver growled something, and Koroa's eyes narrowed, looking up from the machine parts. "Not as many as we agreed, Tango."

Charlie raised an eyebrow, gesturing at the silver. "Not as much as we agreed, Big Man." Then he pointed at the components. "This is part of it. The rest is not too far away. I'll give you the coordinates, we leave, you can go pick them up."

Koroa nodded, and made a sound that Sterling understood was a chuckle. "Rest of payment not far. Will send place. Good?"

The smuggler nodded. "Good." He turned to the trucker. "See, Sterling, Koroa here is Kell of his very own House."

The Fallen grunted. "Not Kell. No more Kells. Kells die. Lights kill Kells." Koroa closed the crate of silver, which was set down. "Barely House. Bunch of docked Eliksni try to get by."

" _Kiigoabaa._ " This was from Charlie. "Got that dreg strength," he explained to Sterling. "Never quit and just keep surviving."

Sterling took measure of the three Fallen again and realized, "You don't have any banners."

Koroa grunted again. "No banner. No House. Houses dead or insane." The Fallen leader gestured with a hand. "Misraaks bows to Light's ghouls. Shipstealer bows to Black Fleet. Variks Oathbreaker bows to long dead ways. Scorn filled with brain-rot." Another grunt. "Will not bow to crazed Kells. Me and mine survive alone." The Fallen turned to its fellows, raising its voice, " _Godenboraa!_ "

The other two Fallen straightened up and echoed, _"Godenboraa!_ "

Koroa turned back to Sterling, gesturing at the components. "Old Ketch found." A gesture toward the skies. "Leave cursed system. Leave crazed Houses. Maybe we die. Maybe we escape Black Fleet."

Sterling nodded. "You sound like the Dead Orbit folks. Get out while you can, try to survive." He closed up his truck's trunk. "Good luck to you."

Charlie nodded. "What he said, Koroa. I'll send you the coordinates to the rest of the stash soon as we're on our way."

"Same for silver," the Fallen leader returned. It made a gesture that seemed to be some manner of salute. " _Doenbaas_ , Tango."

"Farewell to you too, Koroa."

A little later, as Sterling drove them away, Charlie took out a comm-link and toggled something. "There we go. Sent Koroa the coordinates for the rest of the goods." The comm-link beeped, and he smiled. "And there's the coordinates for the rest of the payment." He consulted a map, then pointed. "Head to the right here, toward that ravine."

Sterling nodded, driving the truck as directed. "How'd you get to be on good terms with a bunch of Fallen?"

"Ran some jobs out in the Reef." Charlie shrugged. "Spider asked me to check in on these 'Houseless scavs' back dirt-side. Think he was hopin' that they'd hear it was him sent me to dig 'em out of the hole they were dug in, get 'em to join up with his syndicate." He shook his head. "Koroa and his boys, they want nothing to do with anyone. They just want to be left alone."

Sterling digested that a bit. "Well... I guess if they can get a ship and get out of here, then we'll have one less group of Fallen to deal with. Thieving bastards killed my cousin back before we moved to the City."

"Hey," Charlie pointed a finger at him. "Don't knock 'em. Fallen been done dirty by life." He frowned as he looked out the window. "Just like we were. Things go sideways with the Black Fleet in town, we'll end up in the same boat as them, like as not."

He signaled to stop, and Sterling pulled the truck to a halt. "You ain't wrong. Another House of Dregs running scared."


	2. Never Bow Again

The message was sent out on a broadwave transmission frequency. The voice spoke in the common human tongue, assured that the message would be understood by all who needed to receive it.

_"To my Eliksni brothers and sisters out amongst the stars and here at home on Europa--We are the future of our kind, and we will destroy all who threaten us! Remember: Light only burns bright so long, but Darkness is forever!"_

The crew looked at one another as the transmission ended. One of the older sucked in a breath, which gurgled in his throat, before grunting and clapping his hands together to set the crew back to work. "Engine isn't going to fix itself," he grunted. He fussed with the component in his hand, working the point of his knife into a seam to prise open a panel.

"Are we going to ignore the message?" The older crewman lifted his gaze to the one who spoke, one of the younger whelps, one who had grown tall, but lean and stretched in the limbs. The whelp gestured at the screen where the message had been broadcast. "Eramis Shipstealer grows strong. She calls for Eliksni to flock to her banner." The whelp turned his head, aware he had the attention of the crew in the room, and saw others poking their heads into the room as his voice carried. "We skulk and hide, trying to fix a ketch that will never fly again, with barely enough ether to get by--"

The elder jammed his knife into the worktable in front of him. "Check your tone, Ezziur."

Ezziur snarled, needle-sharp teeth flashing. "Check _your_ tone, Hanka! Why do we keep cowering when we could--"

"--could crawl on our bellies beneath another doomed banner." This was not from Hanka. All present straightened up as their leader appeared in the hatch, removing a truncated captain's ether-mask and hanging it off his belt. Koroa narrowed his eyes at the stretched-out whelp as he strode forward. "You would have us bow to a Kell?"

"We are starving!" Ezziur snapped. "With the Dark Kell, we could survive--"

"--and for how long?" His voice was flat. "The Shipstealer is a Kell as we knew them." He slapped a hand against one of his lower stumps. "Docking for failure. Killing for pleasure. Fighting a war without end. Too proud to know when to stop."

"Your pride will kill us all," the whelp growled.

Koroa eyed him for a moment, then turned to Hanka. "Elder, tell the whelp of your first Kell."

The older Eliksni sat back, showing his teeth. "Gusar, Last Kell of House Waters." He paused, hearing the susurration from the other crew around him. "Lost much of House Waters' fleet in battle against Cabal on the Red Planet." He tapped his outer-left eye, which did not glow, its socket crusted with scar tissue. "Took my eye for looking at him when we retreated." Another gurgling breath. "I had spoken nothing against him. Served him loyally since I left the creche. And he took my eye anyway."

Koroa nodded, looking at Ezziur, then turned again, pointing up at another Eliksni half-way out of a vent. "Brazga. Tell the whelp of your last House."

"House Winter," the Eliksni replied, dropping to the floor. They pulled their tunic off, revealing a chest criss-crossed with scars. "When I didn't bow low enough to the Prime Servitor, Archon took their swords to me. Kell stayed their hand, but threw me off the ketch. Starved me of ether for a breadth of spans. Scars never healed." Brazga glared at Ezziur. "Winter Kell loved pain and all the ways they could cause it. Shed no sorrow when Lights killed him. Shed no sorrow when Winter Archon was claimed by the Taken Kell."

And so it went, around the engine room, Eliksni after Eliksni speaking of the cruelties of Kells and Archons. Of the madness that infected any who sat in a ketch's throne. Limbs docked for pointless reasons. Worthless waste of lives sent up against the Lights. The ruthless greed that drove them to steal even the paltriest of treasures that dregs and whelps managed to bring back. It came back to Hanka, who spoke of the last Kell he'd served, the Mad Wolf himself, who chopped off one of the elder's legs.

Hanka rose, the mechanical replacement of that limb unfolding with a ratcheting sound, the metal claw on the end scraping as he advanced on Ezziur, who looked as though he'd rather be anywhere than in this room, right now. "No good will come of flocking to the Dark Kell's banner," he told the whelp.

"No more Kells," Koroa spoke, his tone firm and grave. "No more Archons. No more banners. We would rather stand tall and starve, rather than bow and crawl to live," Koroa told him. He drew his sword from his back and held it high. " _Godenboraa!_ "

The Eliksni in the room all drew their knives and held them up as well, echoing their rallying cry. " _Godenboraa!_ "

Koroa looked at the whelp again. Ezziur stared back, and then reached back to trace a dactyl over the network of scars on his own spine. And finally he rose to his full height and nodded. " _Godenboraa_."

"Bannerless forever," Koroa agreed. "We will never bow again."

Their unity reaffirmed again, the crew-- joined now by their captain-- bent back to their work.


	3. Demagogue

They had arrived in the ruins of a human city. Koroa let his gaze look over the other Eliksni who had gathered here, from other crews, most of them wearing the tattered colors of House Dusk. Some still wore strips of cloth from older banners, most of them were grizzled veterans of the Long Siege. He spared a glance toward Hanka, but the old Eliksni was fussing with his ether mask, grumbling at it.

The broadwave transmissions from Europa kept coming. While all of their crew had tacitly agreed to ignore them, one had come through from another one of the Shipstealer's followers, asking all Eliksni to come and hear his message. Koroa knew it was going to be angry and poisonous, but it still needed to be heard, if only so it could then be dismissed.

"A few Winter over there," Hanka grunted, gesturing across the plaza. Koroa looked and saw them, led by a Captain with strips of Winter banner wrapped around the hafts of his swords. A few wretches with him had similar strips tied beneath the heads of their spears. Koroa pointed out other crews around the plaza. "Remnant Wolves. Some Devils."

Hanka grunted again, scratching at the join of his mechanical leg. "What message do you think he will give?"

Koroa shook his head. "Hate. Too much of it in Gaitza's blood."

The clamoring of the various crews in the plaza quieted as a pair of Eliksni appeared on a balcony from one of the nearby buildings. They both wore the banner of the Shipstealer's new House. One carried a war-hammer, which he clanged on the railing of the balcony to draw the attention of the plaza. He raised his voice, amplified to a roar. "Raise your eyes! Hear the voice of your salvation! Survivor of the Lights, who fought the Violet King and lived! Gaitza!"

The barker stepped back to allow the other to step forward. This one wore the robes of an archon, and his body was crisscrossed with scars. He carried an archon's staff, which he raised with along with his hands. Gaitza's voice was likewise amplified, but he spoke quietly.

"Hear me, Eliksni. Hear me, children of a lost planet." The scarred archon's eyes swept over the plaza. "Listen to me, Riis-lost. Listen to me, Whirlwind-scattered. Listen to me, those brought low by the assassins of the City of Thieves, the City of Murder, the City That Docks." He cast a hand out, gesturing broadly. "Listen to me, Winter-born. Listen to me, be you broken Wolf, scattered Devil, or outcast Exile."

Gaitza paused, assured he had the attention of the whole plaza. He drew a rasping breath. "They name us Fallen, in mockery of our noble past, even as they preen in their Light and beneath the Great Machine they stole from us. We seek to reclaim our glory, and so they jealously guard it from us. When we try to rise back to our proud station, they kill our Primes, our Kells," and here, he touched his scarred chest, "our Archons." He shook his head slowly. "Our great Houses-- the mightiest that survived the Whirlwind-- are broken by their ghouls for daring to aspire to match their grandeur."

Hanka grumbled next to Koroa, who folded his arms as he watched not just the archon, but the crowd. There was murmuring, the kind that he knew too well. The kind that could be whipped into a frenzy, into a riot, under the expert touch of a demagogue. Koroa had seen archons and Kells do it before. Not all Kells used force to keep their followers in line, when the right word would serve just as well.

"We know your pain. We have felt the sting of their bullets, the fire of their hate." Gaitza had spread open his robes to fully show the scope of the scarring that covered his body. "We who had not fought in the Long Siege stood apart from you, but were we spared their fury? " His staff clanged on the balcony railing, and the archon's voice turned hot with anger. "No, we were not. Our Skiffs have been attacked. Our people bombarded by the false machine-god called Ras-Puu-Tin which they fashioned and forgot. Our nests are driven below ground, away from the light and into shadow."

With another rasping breath, Gaitza calmed himself, and his voice lowered back to the quiet conviction. "We know your pain, o children of the Whirlwind. They will never stop shooting their hate. They will never let us live in peace. We threaten their would-be supremacy. So long as a single Eliksni breathes, they will hunt us down out of pure spite. They will finish what the Whirlwind started, and drive us into oblivion."

This got another murmur out of the crowd, a louder one, one which bubbled with rage. Koroa could feel it welling up in him as well. How many times had he seen Fallen crews-- who had done nothing to any humans and had actively avoided them-- get cut down by the Lights, simply for existing? Too many. He growled at the thought. Lights that patterned themselves off the Fallen-Bane, the Violet King.

Gaitza raised a hand toward the skies. "Our lives have been pain since the Whirlwind sent us fleeing to the stars. Our lives have been pain since the vaunted House of Stone was broken in the wake of the theft of the Great Machine. Our lives have been pain since we came to this cursèd star." He lowered his hand, curling his dactyls into a fist as he hissed, "If fate is to gift us nothing but pain, then pain shall be our weapon."

His hand traced over his scars as he spoke quietly again, and it was almost mesmerizing. Koroa found himself watching those dactyls running over the lines carved in the archon's flesh, and he knew that so many of the Eliksni in the plaza were doing the same. "Pain has sharpened us. We are stronger for it. We dock our Dregs, that they might find their strength and earn the right to grow back what is lost to them. We test our followers, that they might keep their strength and avoid complacence. We test our leaders, that they might prove their strength to lead."

Gaitza gestured toward the warrior who had heralded him. "Pain has hardened us. Those who cannot find their strength wither, forever stunted without the ether to grow. Those who cannot keep their strength perish, unfit to become more than what they are. Those who cannot prove their strength die, unworthy to wear the cape and sword of authority."

Koroa shook himself as he came back to himself, glancing at Hanka as the elder grumbled again. The scarred archon wielded his words with expert skill. He was almost taken in. The growling from the crowd was getting sharper now, and Koroa knew that they'd follow him to Shipstealer's banner. It was good that he hadn't brought some of the younger crew like Ezziur. They would have fallen for it.

"We say to you, Eliksni, of whatever banner you hide beneath, come to us." Gaitza held out a hand, like he were asking them to take it. "There is a place for you under our banner. A new banner. Our lives were once full of fear and spite and doom. But those who are Fallen shall rise once more. We know your ambitions, your aspirations. Ours is not a house of weakness. Ours is a house of strength."

Koroa turned to Hanka, shaking his head. There was nothing to be gained from listening to the rest of the mad archon's speech. They started to withdraw slowly. Being near the perimeter of the plaza and crowd, it was easier to do. If they'd been among the crowd in general, he knew their departure would cause that roiling mob to descend upon them and tear them apart, drinking the ether from their steaming corpses.

Behind them, he heard Gaitza growl, "And to those sneaking Crows and crouching Hidden who will hear these words? Know this:

"Our blades are sharp. Our eyes are clear. For every agony you have inflicted on us, you will know tenfold. We will take back what you have stolen from us. And return to you naught but pain."

Koroa heard the conviction in the archon's voice, but it only hardened his own resolve and conviction. There was nothing in the Shipstealer's House for them but more war and death. Better to stay out of it, and survive that much longer. No more Kells or Archons. No banners for them. " _Godenboraa_ ," he muttered to himself. Bannerless forever.


	4. Fallen, Not Forgotten

The mood was grim in the ruined ketch. Koroa could smell it.

The trip out to the graveyard of wrecked ships in the old spaceport had not gone well. For all that the crew had managed to acquire the materials and components they'd been looking for, it had not been without cost. Various other Eliksni had been there-- wearing the purple banner, but as Houseless as themselves-- and had not wanted to share in the scavenging spoils. This, alongside the Lights running around, and a resurgent Hive brood. Koroa hadn't been overly concerned. They'd avoided trouble so far.

But as they'd been extracting computer components from the disused Warmind bunkers, a crew from the Dark Kell's House had turned up. There had been shooting, and the towering Salvation captain had flung ice around at them. Koroa had managed to get his people out, but Hanka had taken a spear of ice through his thorax, in the process saving Koroa from it.

Back at their hideout, Koroa and his crew gathered in silence around a table. Laid atop it was a drab, almost colorless gray banner, without sigil. Arranged in the middle was a pile of herealways that the old Eliksni had kept, along with his cracked and broken mask, his knife laid in front of it all. The crew linked upper arms as they stood around it.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Koroa spoke, low, solemn.

"Hanka. Once of House Waters, of House Wolves, of House Dusk. Now of None. Once born on Riis, scattered before the Whirlwind, stalwart before the Black Gale. Proud Eliksni. Now you are Fallen at last."

The crew bowed their heads. Koroa prepared to speak again, but then another spoke up. The stretched-lean Ezziur lifted his head as he spoke.

"Hanka. Once, we clashed. I was hot-tempered. Angry that we were scraping and starving, not going where we must to survive. You tried to check me. And you reminded me of why we burned our banners."

Ezziur paused, breath rasping.

"You are Fallen at last. But I will not forget what you taught me."

The whelp quieted, but then another lifted their head. Brazga's arms went taut around the shoulders of the two to either side, but their voice was clear as they also eulogized the fallen elder.

"Hanka. You found me when House Winter fell. Helped me find a place in your crew. Guided me to safety across the orbits as we fled Lights, Hive, Cabal. I would not be here if not for you."

Koroa waited, then nodded to the others as he spoke up again.

"Hanka. Every one of us here owes you more than we could say. When they would look to me for help, I looked to you, even as you looked to me as well. You were the elder we needed more than the old Elders of Riis. Another Eliksni lost to the Whirlwind, to the Gale. Now you go where there is no war. Where there is no hate. Where you will want for nothing."

As one, the crew laid a hand on the colorless banner. Koroa intoned quietly the next. As he spoke the ancient word whose meaning had been lost in the Whirlwind, the crew echoed it.

" _Yarra._ Go now to find your place in the Land of Endless Ether. _Yarra_. May the Great Machine guide you through the Calm Lands to the House of Eternity. _Yarra_. You are Fallen, but not Forgotten."

Then he added what had become part of their new tradition.

" _Yarra_. Go where there are no banners to divide us. _Godenboraa_. Bannerless forever. _Yarra yarra yarra_."

They all bowed their heads as they repeated the conclusion of the rite. After a moment's silence, he divided the trinkets up among the crew equally, speaking to them, "Carry this with you for a span. A reminder that he is here, always with you." Then he quietly folded the banner around the mask and knife, and one last remaining herealways, which he personally took to bury near the ketch.

And so another spark passed from the world.


End file.
